The Snail and the Whale

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This is the tide coming into the bay, And these are the villagers shouting, “Hooray!” As the whale and the snail travel safely away . . . These are the caves Beneath the waves, Where stripy fish with featery fins And sharks with hideous toothy grins Swam round the whale And the snail on his tail. Read this again (November 2019) as I can't resist the brilliant Donaldson/Scheffler combination. And it is just as good, if not better, than when I first read it.

The Snail and the Whale was adapted for the stage by the theatre company Tall Stories in 2012, and has been on tour around the United Kingdom and the rest of the world. Everyone, including the local firemen rushed to the beach and they all began spraying the whale to keep him cool while some of the children dug around him to provide water from under the sand. Then the tide came in and much to everyone's relief the whale, complete with snail on its tail, took to the water once more. Funnily enough, I find it harder to write not in verse, though I feel I am now getting the hang of it! My novel THE GIANTS AND THE JONESES is going to be made into a film by the same team who made the Harry Potter movies, and I have written three books of stories about the anarchic PRINCESS MIRROR-BELLE who appears from the mirror and disrupts the life of an otherwise ordinary eight-year-old. I have just finished writing a novel for teenagers.

Before Malcolm and I had our three sons we used to go busking together and I would write special songs for each country; the best one was in Italian about pasta. I really enjoy writing verse, even though it can be fiendishly difficult. I used to memorise poems as a child and it means a lot to me when parents tell me their child can recite one of my books.

They sailed to towering icebergs and far off lands, fiery mountains and golden sands and all the while the waves arched and crashed around them but the snail remained safe on the tail of the whale. When they went underwater the snail was still safe and she was much admired by passing stripy fish and sharks with hideous grins. The Snail and the Whale is a heart-warming story about how friendship can come about in the most remarkable way.

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The human activity makes the humans swim too close to the shore. Can you find out when this might have happened to real whales in the past? Discuss what we might be able to do to stop it from happening again. There are lots of adjectives and other descriptive words in the story which describe different things. Can you find them all? Could you make a poster which shows what they are? The whale sang a song to the snail. Could you write the words to the song or make up a tune for it?

Icebergs, fiery mountains and golden sands, caves beneath the crashing waves, and storm tossed seas are all part of the adventure. And then the whale gets lost and he ends up on the beach in trying to avoid speedboats. It looks like the end of the journey for the poor whale.Imagine that you had to write a newspaper report about the people (and the snail) who saved the whale. What would it say? And this is the snail with the itchy foot! “A snail! A snail!” The teacher turns pale. “Look!” say the children. ”It's leaving a trail.” This is the trail Of the tiny snail, A silvery trail saying . . . I also continued to write “grown-up” songs and perform them in folk clubs and on the radio, and have recently released two CDs of these songs. Donaldson has said that it is one of her favourite books, due to its similarity in rhyming style to the works of Edward Lear, of which she was fond of as a child. [1] Plot [ edit ]

On 6 November 2018, it was announced that BBC One and Magic Light Pictures would bring audiences The Snail and the Whale for Christmas 2019. The music is supplied by French composer and musician Rene Aubry, [4] and the animation was provided by Triggerfish Animation Studios. [5] The 26-minute production aired on BBC One at 2:30pm on 25 December 2019, [6] and again at 2:05pm on 1 January 2020. It was released on DVD on 10 February 2020 in the United Kingdom.Even though the snail is small, he helps to save the whale. Think about your abilities. Is there anything that you thought you couldn’t do, but you managed to when you tried? There is a lot of rhyming in the story. Can you find the rhyming words? Can you find other words which rhyme with them? My real breakthrough was THE GRUFFALO, again illustrated by Axel. We work separately - he’s in London and I’m in Glasgow - but he sends me letters with lovely funny pictures on the envelopes.